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View Full Version : Attic truss altered?



mathew stouffer
10-28-2009, 03:29 PM
It appears these trusses may have been altered but I was not sure. The pics are the best I could do:o

Nick Ostrowski
10-28-2009, 03:43 PM
Hard to tell from the pics. Those nail plates are huge.

mathew stouffer
10-28-2009, 03:48 PM
That's what I was looking at as well. First time i have seen plates like that.

Erby Crofutt
10-28-2009, 05:25 PM
I doubt they've been field modified. Just ain't that easy to press the plates in the field. But they sure are HUGE plates for the purpose.

Jack Feldmann
10-28-2009, 06:00 PM
Maybe they were all they had at the factory that day.

Steve Frederickson
10-28-2009, 06:14 PM
Very strange to see trusses with a ridge board (at least, it looks like a ridge board, with the truss plates bent around the ridge). How would they ship something like that :confused:

mathew stouffer
10-28-2009, 06:24 PM
Here is another pic. There are two ridge boards with ridge venting between.

Steve Frederickson
10-28-2009, 06:42 PM
That makes a little more sense. Is this a modular house?

mathew stouffer
10-28-2009, 08:17 PM
No it is a large 4 story condo complex

mathew stouffer
10-28-2009, 08:19 PM
Opps, I meant three story:)

Matt Fellman
10-28-2009, 08:40 PM
They do look odd but I doubt I'd mention it. If I were inspecting the whole building I may recommend that someone chase down the plans or ask the builder about it.

It's extremely unlikely a building like that wasn't overseen very closely during contruction. As an HI you can very quickly start to poke your nose where it doesn't belong and lose a lot of credibility if/when you're wrong..... IMO

Snow in Utah already?

Bruce Breedlove
10-28-2009, 10:31 PM
Colorado got snow Wednesday. We only got a couple inches but Denver got much more and some places in the mountains got dumped on.

mathew stouffer
10-29-2009, 08:00 AM
The mountains got about 5 inches on Aug 14th and it melted in about 8 mins:) Over the past 48 hrs Park City received about 4 but like Bruce said, some Mt locations received two feet. Winter comes early here.
Alta Ski Area Welcomes You (http://www.alta.com/)

John Kogel
10-29-2009, 08:43 AM
Here is another pic. There are two ridge boards with ridge venting between.Those look to me like short blocks between the trusses. I would not say the trusses have been altered, based only on these pics.

You could recommend having a builder check the trusses, but i don't see the problem from here. :)

archivoyeur
10-29-2009, 08:49 AM
Those look to me like short blocks between the trusses. I would not say the trusses have been altered, based only on these pics.

You could recommend having a builder check the trusses, but i don't see the problem from here. :)

That's what I see too.

mathew stouffer
10-29-2009, 09:05 AM
Thanks guys. Have a great weekend, and extra adult beverages for Halloween;)

Jack Feldmann
10-29-2009, 03:30 PM
First of all, I was in an attic today and the trusses had some oversize plates on them too. I am positive they were not altered - just big plates.

Second, that condo complex could very well be modular buildings. I have inspected many threes story modular buildings. The clues are in the attics, under, and some interior walls. Notice any door frames where the wall is like 8" wide? Looking at the photo again, it could easily be a modular building.

There will sometimes be a data plate somewhere inside.
Electrical connections in the attics can also be a clue.
The underside is the real give away, but you may not be able to see it on this one.

Linda Swearingen
10-30-2009, 06:51 AM
The 2x4's look newer or fresher than the rafters; could this be a retrofit fix for a sagging ridge? Would you see whether the lower ends of the larger rafters were nailed or had gusset plates too?

Dan Cullen
10-31-2009, 05:10 AM
I agree with Linda. It almost looks like a stick built roof that has some chords added to beef it up at mid-span on the left side. Erby's right also on the difficulty of pressing the gussets on-site. It's a head scratcher fer-sher. Why not just ask the seller to provide the engineering drawings and the bill of sale from the truss mfr. if there was one?

Stacey Van Houtan
10-31-2009, 05:07 PM
Overside plate are not unusual. Yes the 2 bys would look differet. They were shiped, stacke and may come form a local lumber yard. Go out and follow some construction projects.

Stacey Van Houtan
10-31-2009, 05:07 PM
Overside plate are not unusual. Yes the 2 bys would look differet. They were shiped, stacke and may come form a local lumber yard. Go out and follow some construction projects.

John Kogel
10-31-2009, 09:14 PM
The top chords look like 2 X 6. Generally better quality, larger diameter logs are used to make them. There is more of the heartwood showing, so they look darker. They are manufactured trusses, built to strict standards.

Jack Feldmann
11-01-2009, 04:51 AM
Ask the seller to provide engineering drawings and bill of sale from truss manf??????
I don't know of many (if any) condo owners that have a copy or access to the original construction documents or engineering documents.

The other thing is outside of the inspector questioning the large metal plates, there doesn't seem to be anything wrong here.